Conference focuses on racial healing in foster care system

March 18, 2011

MEDIA CONTACT: Diane Daniel, CLASS Publicist, (510) 885-3183

By Diane Daniel

Terry Jones, Cal State East Bay professor emeritus of social work, will keynote an April 8 conference on "Racial Healing in the Foster Care System: What's Love Got to Do with it." The program will be held at the university's Oakland Center.

The all-day program will address a foster care system that Jones says is performing as "home breakers" rather than "home builders."

"The foster care system has not served African American children and families well," said Jones. "There are a disproportionate number of African Americans committed to foster care, they stay in foster care longer than whites, and when they exit, they exit to a situation of turmoil and uncertainty."

"We can and should do better than we have done. From a policy perspective we need to move from a 'blaming the victim' approach to a recognition that our institutions are failing African American youth, families and communities," Jones said.

He will stress the need to both recognize the reality of class conflict and inequality, while formulating better survival strategies for foster care youth about to age out of the system.

Another presentation will look at an institutional racism analysis of child welfare policies, while Robert Jemerson, head trainer for the Alameda County Independent Living Skills Program, will facilitate the plenary, a panel discussion with questions and answers.

The event luncheon will honor Carol Collins, assistant agency director of the Alameda County Department of Children and Family Services.

The conference is sponsored by Cal State East Bay, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Pivotal Point Youth Services, Alameda County Independent Living Skills Program, Alameda County Social Services Agency and Beyond Emancipation.

California State University, East Bay is the San Francisco East Bay Area's high-access public university of choice. CSUEB serves the region with campuses in Hayward and Concord, a professional development center in Oakland, and an innovative online campus. With an enrollment of more than 14,000, the University offers a nationally recognized freshman year experience, award-winning curriculum, personalized instruction, and expert faculty. Students choose from among more than 100 professionally focused fields of study for which the University confers bachelor's and master's degrees, as well as an Ed.D. in education. Named a "Best in the West" college, as well as a Best Business School, by the influential Princeton Review, Cal State East Bay is among the region's foremost producers of teachers, business professionals and entrepreneurs, public administrators, health professionals, literary and performing artists, and science and math graduates.